Brian Armstrong of Coinbase, Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX and Zhao Changpeng of Binance have topped a Chinese ranking of blockchain billionaires.
According to Hurun Report’s 2020 Global Rich List, released Tuesday, there are 17 blockchain billionaires – individuals whose wealth is predominantly derived from cryptocurrency exchanges, investors or miners – 11 of whom were new additions in 2020.
Brian Armstrong CEO of Coinbase heads the list with a stated net worth of $11.5 billion ahead of the crypto exchange’s public listing expected to be valued at $100 billion.
CEO of FTX Sam Bankman-Fried ($10 billion), and CEO of Binance Zhao Changpeng ($8 billion) follow in second and third places.
Other notable entries include the Winklevoss twins tied in seventh place ($2.8 billion) and Michael Saylor, co-founder of MicroStrategy, ($2.4 billion) who shares ninth place with Matthew Roszak, co-founder of Bloq.
Conspicuous by his absence, Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto ought to top the list with an estimated wealth of $50 billion, though cannot be included as his identity is not known, Hurun said.
This figure would in fact win Nakamoto a place in the top 25 of Hurun’s overall Rich List, headed by Tesla CEO and crypto tweeter Elon Musk ($197 billion), Amazon founder Jess Bezos ($189 billion) and LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault ($114 billion).